You can mine bitcoin on any computer out there, and it doesn’t even have to be yours. In fact, I did it on my desktop computer at work. In this story, I’ll tell you how it all went down.
The year was 2014, and I was intrigued by the idea of day trading. All you have to do is look at the charts, spot some trends, and prepare a room for big fat benjamins that’ll start rolling out. Sounds intriguing, doesn’t it?
In order to start, I had to sign up for a brokerage account. It felt a bit intimidating, trading with my hard-earned money. Also, I wanted to be sure I won’t lose it all on day 1. So I decided to sign up for a training account to test the waters first.
I logged in, and there it was. A nicely rounded, slightly tilted orange icon with a big, bold B in the middle. That’s how I first discovered Bitcoin. I didn’t understand its technology by that time. But being the research freak that I am, I started looking more into it.
It turns out you don’t have to be a genius to understand the concept of crypto. What surprised me is that everyone can join the Bitcoin network. But what really surprised me was how easy it is to start mining. All you need to do is download mining software, install it, and you’re ready to roll.
My laptop is plugged in, the mining software is installed, and I’m radiating with excitement. All of this could mean only one thing. The mining is about to begin. I pressed the button, and my excitement starts to slowly but steadily fade out.
My operation experienced a big blocker right from the start. My laptop sounds like it’s about to blow up.
Concerned about my well-being and the safety of my neighbors. I stopped everything I was doing and went into deep thought. Maybe I did something wrong; maybe my notebook isn’t powerful enough. Either way, I wasn’t about to give up. Let me try this on my computer at work.
I downloaded the same software, followed the same instructions. Only to achieve the same result. The sound reminding me of a slightly overpriced lawnmower.
However, I felt it’s not the time to give up just yet. I stopped the mining and asked Google for help. And help I received. I discovered a couple of key things about mining:
- The computer is working at full capacity, so it can get noisy.
- You can’t do anything else on the computer while it’s mining
While these 2 things can look like major bumps in the road to you. I knew I can find a way around them. I’ll just have to come up with a good plan.
Before I share with you my secret mining schedule, I think it’s important to give you an idea how my office space looked like.
Someone wise said that one picture could say thousands of words. And since I’m lazy to write that much, I went ahead and drew it.
I shared the office with my colleague. So mining when he’s there was out of the question. The other problem concerning me was the toilet. As people would be walking by, they could hear the noise.
So one evening, I decided to perform a noise test. Only to find out I was stressing out for nothing. Standing in the big hall, I couldn’t hear a thing. While in my office, the computer was “mowing” Bitcoin.
It was time to get back into the mining game.
I came up with a schedule that would minimize the potential risk of getting caught. The biggest variable in the mining equation was my colleague. So I centered my operation based on his presence in the office. And here is how it went:
- Wait for my colleague to go home
- Start mining, close the door and leave the office
- Come back in the morning and stop mining
- Repeat the process the next day
It seems like a tedious process, but I was kinda excited about it. Maybe the fear of getting caught was driving my passion. Anyway, I followed the steps for a whole week, and I can proudly say I was able to mine 118 hours that week, which resulted in a whopping 0.0016 BTC.
It’s not that much, but you have to consider these two things:
- It’s completely passive income
- I had no electricity costs
- It didn’t affect my work schedule
I decided to continue and set my goal to mine 1 Bitcoin, which was a pretty ambitious estimate. And I quickly realized that, but we’ll come to that later. I continued mining in week 2, and the results were pretty much the same. Although, something amazing happened.
I found out my colleague is going on vacation, which opened up a whole new world of possibilities. I could mine for a whole week non-stop, but I had to figure out how I’m gonna work. I couldn’t use my work computer because it was spinning like Evgeni Plushenko at Kings on Ice.
The first option I considered was to take vacation myself, but it wouldn’t get approved on such short notice. So I went with the second option, which was to bring my laptop to work and work on it. And of course, I couldn’t forget about the headphones because of the damn noise.
This week was a huge success, and I was able to mine full time. It resulted in a total of 168 hours of mining time and an increase of 0.0022 BTC in our wallet. The total balance for the whole 3 weeks combined was 0.0054 BTC.
After this successful week, my colleague came back, and I had to switch to the initial schedule. I knew this day would come, so I came prepared. While being alone in the office, I worked on a task script that will turn on mining software at a given time and also turns it off.
This made the whole process automated, and a lot of burdens fell off my shoulders. I could focus solely on my work and let the mining run on its own.
The weeks are coming by, and everything I do at this point is looking at my wallet with a sneaky grin on my face. I am already 6 weeks in, and this is where things come into a turn.
One morning, I came into the office as usual. And to my surprise, my colleague is already sitting there. I started wondering. Did he come before or after the mining was turned off? Either way, I don’t say anything and start working as usual.
And there he goes…
We started talking, and I explained what I’m doing there. You have to realize Bitcoin was not that popular in 2014. So I had to explain a lot of things. At first, I thought this wouldn’t be a problem, and I can continue my operation. But the word got out quickly. And soon, we all received a company memo.
It didn’t say we can’t mine cryptocurrencies specifically, but it prohibited us from conducting any personal business on the company hardware. Which I already knew, but it wasn’t enough to stop me. However, the company memo was. I decided to halt everything and calculate my profits.
For me, the whole mining experiment was a success. But I bet you’re dying to hear how much I made in total. Let’s not wait any longer and jump to the results:
- The mining operation took 6 weeks
- The computer mined 760 hours in total
- I made 0.0117 BTC
- Which converted into 100 USD (you’ll see why)
And now, for the million-dollar question, what happened with my hardly mined Bitcoin? I let it sit in my wallet and quickly forgot about it. As the whole experiment came to an end, I stopped following the mystic world of crypto. and focused on my actual work. Until the year 2018!
2018 was a big year for crypto. Bitcoin experienced a serious rise, and it didn’t stay under my radar. As I was reading news about crypto and Bitcoin, It reminded me of my little experiment. I checked my wallet and saw a fraction of a coin sitting there.
At that time, I didn’t believe the price could rise anymore, so I sold everything for a market price of ~8500 USD.
As I’m writing this article, Bitcoin is sitting at ~40000 USD making my sell order not the smartest decision. But I wasn’t in the mining game to become the next crypto millionaire. I was there for the experience.
I wasn’t able to reach my goal of mining 1 Bitcoin. Maybe if I reduced the mining hours and only mine at night when no one is there? It would definitely take longer, but the risk of getting caught is much smaller.
Anyway, I really enjoyed the mining experience. It definitely made my regular workday more exciting, but I wouldn’t recommend trying this at your work.
The mining efficiency has dropped drastically since 2014. You need much better hardware, and you’re still risking serious punishment. I got off easy, but who knows what can happen in a company with a more serious culture.
But hey, I just told you my opinion. Will it stop you from trying?
This article is for informational purposes only. It should not be considered Financial or Legal Advice. Not all information will be accurate. Consult a financial professional before making any major financial decisions.
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